POV-Ray : Newsgroups : povray.general : which mathematics does POV-Ray use? : Re: which mathematics does POV-Ray use? Server Time
30 Jul 2024 04:15:30 EDT (-0400)
  Re: which mathematics does POV-Ray use?  
From: clipka
Date: 16 Nov 2009 13:10:57
Message: <4b0195b1$1@news.povray.org>
marky.addison schrieb:
> 
> I am looking but can not find, what kind of mathematics does POV-Ray use.
> He is primarily Ray tracer but he also uses radiocsity algorithm. Am
> I right?
> Please give me some links to some theoretical part of POV-Ray. Thank you!

At its origin and core, POV-Ray is indeed a classic (backward) 
raytracing software. There should be ample information out on the net 
about the mathematical details.


As for what POV-Ray calls radiosity, the algorithm is based on the 1988 
paper "A Ray Tracing Solution for Diffuse Interreflection" by Greg 
(Gregory J.) Ward et al.

A PDF version can be found at 
http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~gfx/Courses/2003/ImageSynthesis/papers/Monte%20Carlo/Ray%20Tracing%20Solution%20for%20Diffuse%20Interreflection.pdf,

but it lacks the figures.

http://radsite.lbl.gov/radiance/papers/sg88/paper.html has .gif and 
.tiff files scanned from a paper copy, which do include the figures.

There are other sites showing up on google which charge money for a PDF 
version of the paper, but I don't know whether it is any different from 
the one fount on virginia.edu.


Another algorithm used in POV-Ray that deserves mention is photon 
mapping, but I can't give any pointers on that one.


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